Johan Scholliers

Can cyclist safety be improved with intelligent transport systems

In recent years, Intelligent Transport Systems (ITS) have assisted in the decrease of road traffic fatalities, particularly amongst passenger car occupants. Vulnerable Road Users (VRUs) such as pedestrians, cyclists, moped riders and motorcyclists, however, have not been that much in focus when developing ITS. Therefore, there is a clear need for ITS which specifically address VRUs as an integrated element of the traffic system. This paper presents the results of a quantitative safety impact assessment of five systems that were estimated to have high potential to improve the safety of cyclists, namely: Blind Spot Detection (BSD), Bicycle to Vehicle communication (B2V), Intersection safety (INS), Pedestrian and Cyclist Detection System+Emergency Braking (PCDS+EBR) and VRU Beacon System (VBS). An ex-ante assessment method proposed by Kulmala (2010) targeted to assess the effects of ITS for cars was applied and further developed in this study to assess the safety impacts of ITS specifically designed for VRUs. The main results of the assessment showed that all investigated systems affect cyclist safety in a positive way by preventing fatalities and injuries. The estimates considering 2012 accident data and full penetration showed that the highest effects could be obtained by the implementation of PCDS+EBR and B2V, whereas VBS had the lowest effect. The estimated yearly reduction in cyclist fatalities in the EU-28 varied between 77 and 286 per system. A forecast for 2030, taking into accounts the estimated accident trends and penetration rates, showed the highest effects for PCDS+EBR and BSD.

A Concept for Improving the Security and Efficiency of Multimodal Supply Chains

Multimodal supply chains are characterized by multiple changes of transport modes and vehicles. Hence the risks for theft, untimely delivery and freight quality deterioration increase. There is hence a growing need to manage the security and efficiency of consignments from door to door. This paper describes the results of the Finnish national SCIE (Supply Chain Security and Integrity) project, which had as main objective the development of a holistic framework for the management of the security and efficiency of supply chains. A profound risk analysis was performed to find key vulnerabilities of the service and suitable monitoring technology. The security service was developed to deal with the vast amount of actors in the multimodal supply chain, accurate transport plan data reception and the identification of exceptional situations. The service concept was tested by monitoring and analysing steel product shipments from Finland to Central Europe. Advanced intelligent monitoring devices were attached to the consignments. These devices gathered and transmitted in real-time environmental, transport stress and location information. The paper will give an overview of the framework, service concept and the analysed results of a multimodal shipment from Finland to Italy.

Improving Safety and Dependability by Enhancing the Availability of Product Specific Information

In order to maintain the safety and dependability of modern and complex technical systems over their entire life cycle, continuous availability of information is of crucial importance. This paper deals with a new safety and dependability information system concept. The concept aims for better availability and utilisation of product specific safety and dependability information. Thus, it also supports decision making in the daily operations at companies. The focus of this paper is to describe one part of the information system concept, i.e. a prototype of the smart transponder. This transponder allows the identification of a machine combined with archiving, storing and updating functions, especially for safety and dependability data and knowledge. The prototype is expected, after some further refinement, to fulfil the need for the continuous availability of safety and dependability information during the entire life cycle of machines.

Security analysis and review of digital signature-based low-cost RFID tag authentication

BACKGROUND: In logistic processes, radio frequency identification (RFID) technology provides possibilities for improving the integrity of shipments, the performance of supply chains and for enabling leaner processes. RFID tags are used in logistics to identify and authenticate users, products or shipments. Especially cheap, passive long-range low-cost RFID tags are of interest, but these provide security-related challenges. In new implementations of this RFID technology the threats and risks must be carefully considered as they can result in system malfunctioning, revenue losses and illegal activities. Hence, there is a need for cryptography techniques for low-cost RFID tags. Various lightweight security mechanisms that take into account the limitations of the tags have been designed. The potentiality of using asymmetric cryptography and digital signatures in tags is one such mechanism that enables more secure tag authentication. RESULTS: This paper explores how asymmetric digital signatures have been used for RFID tag authentication. The paper provides a literature overview of the methods used in both research and in commercial products, and provides knowledge about gained and missing protection in such use cases. A method based on asymmetric Elliptic Curve Digital Signature Algorithm (ECDSA) digital signatures has been developed for the authentication of low-cost RFID tags. In addition to this, the paper categorizes RFID threats to categories as presented in IETF RFC 4949 and analyzes how using asymmetric cryptography-based digital signatures protects against described threats and attacks suitable for low-cost RFID tags that do not use additional security mechanisms. CONCLUSIONS: This paper finds that asymmetric cryptography and digital signatures are suitable for low-cost RFID tags and that usage of them gives additional security, especially against physical data modification and impersonation attacks. The research underlines that IETF RFC 4949 is suitable for categorization of threats and attacks towards RFID technology. In addition to this, systematic threat and attack categorization and analysis enables the specification of further threats.